Manufactured bands on the slide?

Just looking through the ticketmaster newsletter for info on The White Stripes when I saw this.

Now I live in Ballina and my question is if Liberty X are a world famous band why are they playing a **** hole like Ballina? Maybe the manufactured band bubble has burst? Doubtful, but hey I can pray its true.

RE*AC*TOR

I bet they sell pepsi in ballina. Probably don't sell a wole lot of Dom Pergnon though,

Doctor J

I don't think manufactured music is on the slide, it's just changing it's form. The next wave of manufactured music will be guitar based. The pop bubble we've had to endure is deflating, but there will always be a market of 6-16 year old girls who'll need some pretty boys to fawn over. You can see it happening. Guitar based manufactured music will be the next devil on the radio.

RE*AC*TOR

That's very true - just look at Avril Lavigne and Busted - still very manufactured but aiming at a different dollar. They're going for the faux teen-angst dollar, that's a good dollar.

lordsippa

Yeah but guitar pop isn't as bad tbh... I mean the Monkees were far from the worst band ever (that is reserved for Abba), and their show even had lots of great musicians on it!

But the biggest positive point on this is that at least it's freeing up r&b and other such musics from the absolutely shíte that was destroying their souls. I mean, I'm a rocker by choice but classic Rnb is just great! And rock n' roll is coming back, so i doubt guitar pop can ruin THAT. Metal's just recovering from the whole nu-metal crap that took over for so long, so that's also looking like a likely survivor of the "pop effect" this time.

So hopefully my optimism will pay off

grumpytrousers

Aye - what we're probably witnessing is the bubble bursting, and the record companies begin to realise that them trotting out the same ol' rubbish year in year out isn't sustainable indefinitely.

In the last 10-12 year mainstream 'pop' music really hasn't evolved to a large extent. If we take the line 'Take That' were the first huge pop-group/boy-band of the nineties, nothing new came after them. We got
East 17 (Take That for girlz who were cool),
Boyzone (Irish Take That),
Spice Girls (Female Take That Except They Didn't Write Their Own Stuff Really), Westlife (For Those Who Thought There's Nowt Wrong With Insipid Syrupy Ballads),
And a whole plethora of others, Atomic Kitten, Blue, 5ive, S Club 7 and (much to the delight of the nonces down D-wing) the S Club Juniors

Come Big Brother and the whole reality TV explosion and the only 'progression' was that Rik from Walthamstow could get his chance to jack in the job at McDonalds and spend his time singing other peoples songs. On the Telly, and then on the radio (You can insert your own 'There's a guy works down the chip shop swears he's Elvis' joke here)

But the punters seem to have had enough. Liberty X playing down in Ballina is one example (although to be honest, they deserve better - IMHO 'Just A Little' is a top Pop song!) Michelle McMammoth from Pop Idol 2 entering the album charts at number 17 is another.

The goose that laid the golden egg for the record companies is basically readying itself to squeeze out a rotten 'un one of these days. Factor in the whole downloading debacle, and you see an industry that simply can't react fast enough. Anybody could see this time last year that Reality Stars were on the way out. Hell - Six didn't really do anything in Ireland. Gareth Gates (website www.ggates.co.uk - arf!!!) didn't really chart with his last album...but as per usual, the Nigels, Dans and Clems working for Sony/BMG et al didn't realise while they were spending half their nights er...powdering their noses down Soho way, that Joe Public wasn't buying

a) music in general like they used to
b) godawful manufactured dross in anything like the numbers they used to. We never did see that Cheeky Girls third single, did we?

Sure enough there's still manufactured bands, but at least they've got some pedigree about 'em. The Sugababes might get on your wick, but they knock out good singles that pay more than lip service to R'n'B, Busted and McFly...well - at least they'll sort of encourage the kids to pick up guitars...

Brian33

lordsippa wrote:

Yeah but guitar pop isn't as bad tbh... I mean the Monkees were far from the worst band ever (that is reserved for Abba)

:eek: Did you just say what I think you said about Abba?? As a devoted dancing queen, I'm gonna have to get you back for that!

BuffyBot

I mean the Monkees were far from the worst band ever (that is reserved for Abba)

Oooh, they are far from ther bottom of the pile..plenty of folks cushioning them

billy the squid

You can insert your own 'There's a guy works down the chip shop swears he's Elvis' joke here)

Ah now don't be dissing kirsty MacColl, she was great.

just looking at the irish top 30 I see that there is only one song that I actually like in there. The cover version industry seems to give the impression that artists have run out of ideas. Yeah up and comming bands do cover versions when they are starting out but, come on, dont you think that its about time that Ronan Keating for instance is well enough established enough to stop doing covers and start writing his own stuff. Even if he bought songs wrote for him it wouldnt be half as bad.

The Langer song was funny the first time I heard it, why was there a need to re-release it. Its crap now.

and while we are on the subject of re-releases, Aslan has their hit "crazy world" out for the 53rd time.

I hope you are right about the pop bubble bursting, what radio stations here are playing nowadays is brain-melting.